A shipwreck believed to be the oldest ever discovered has been identified in the shallow waters off Kekova Island in southern Türkiye, with a Sydney-based ceramics expert playing a pivotal role in establishing its remarkable age of around 4,500 years.
The find places the vessel in the same era as the construction of the Great Pyramid of Giza, making it a landmark discovery in the history of ancient seafaring and maritime trade.
Ancient Pottery Holds the Key to Dating the World's Oldest Known Shipwreck
While the ship's wooden hull has long since decomposed, a substantial collection of ceramic artefacts remained embedded in the rocky seabed, preserved beneath centuries of barnacle growth. It was these ceramics that allowed researchers to pin down the wreck's age.
Dr Karin Sowada, an archaeologist and ceramics specialist from Macquarie University in Sydney, was invited to join the excavation team by its director after her expertise in Egypt and Bronze Age trade came to the project's attention. The research effort was led by Hakan Öniz, an associate professor from Akdeniz University in Antalya.
Dr Sowada examined more than 20 ceramic items recovered from the site, identifying two main categories of artefacts: ceramic anchors and a range of pottery vessels, including large amphorae reaching up to 50 centimetres in height. These jars were used to carry goods such as grain, oil, wine and resins, strongly suggesting the vessel was a trading ship.
"There were two types of objects discovered during the excavation; one was a series of ceramic anchors, the second type of material was the pottery and there was quite a bit of it left," Dr Sowada said.
Extracting the artefacts was painstaking work. The team used hammers and chisels to free the pottery from its rocky, barnacle-encrusted surroundings. Once brought to the surface, the vessels and anchors were placed in water baths to draw out accumulated salts and prevent the ancient material from crumbling.
Reading the Clay: A Three-Dimensional Jigsaw Puzzle
Dr Sowada described her analysis of the ceramics as an intricate exercise in detective work, studying the composition of the clay and the physical characteristics of each piece to determine both their age and their likely origin.
"Trying to understand the clays, and sort of putting together this three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle, which was really quite exciting," she said.
Lead researcher Dr Öniz noted that the colour of the clay and the decorative styles present on the artefacts also pointed to the ceramics' antiquity, and he credited the project's strength to its use of multiple specialists working together. "When we recognised that this was the earliest one, it was amazing," he said.
Dr Sowada's current assessment is that the wreck most likely resulted from a trading vessel being driven against the rocks, with crew members abandoning ship to survive. "A lot of time and effort has been gone into trying to understand the dating of the shipwreck, which we can do through the ceramics," she said.
Research Still in Its Early Stages
While the dating of the wreck represents a significant breakthrough, researchers say the full story of the vessel is far from complete. Further laboratory tests are currently being conducted on residue found inside the ceramic jars, which may shed light on exactly what cargo the ship was carrying.
Dr Sowada was measured in her assessment of where this discovery sits in the broader history of seafaring. "At this stage, we can certainly say that this is at the very early edge or the very early side of what we know about ancient shipping," she said.
The find underscores how much of the ancient world's maritime history remains hidden beneath the sea, and highlights the value of cross-disciplinary collaboration, bringing together Turkish excavation teams with international specialists such as those based in Sydney. It is also a reminder of the kind of world-first breakthroughs that Sydney researchers are contributing to globally across a wide range of fields.
